The Way I See It is a blog published at least three times a week containing thoughts and analysis and irreverent musings on the local, state, and national sports world.

SEC not getting Mizzou on TV

About this blog

By Dennis Miller

My name is Dennis Miller and I am a lifelong resident of Kirksville, MO. I have been totally blind since birth and a sports fanatic just as long. I like all sports but love baseball and am a proud lifelong member of Cardinal Nation. It is my honor
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My name is Dennis Miller and I am a lifelong resident of Kirksville, MO. I have been totally blind since birth and a sports fanatic just as long. I like all sports but love baseball and am a proud lifelong member of Cardinal Nation. It is my honor to be given the opportunity to write a blog for the Kirksville Daily Express and I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoy writing it.

The midweek blog is always an interesting one to write because I’m never quite sure what to put in it. The Monday and Friday blogs are easy because we either have events to preview or events to review. Neither Kirksville High School basketball team has played yet this week, the Truman State basketball teams are in Topeka for games against Washburn on Wednesday and Missouri is home to face Georgia, I’ll have more on that later. I thought we would cover a couple of things today and then present some random musings on things that have happened over the past couple of weeks that we haven’t had the time or space to cover.

First, the Truman State wrestling team has another home meet on Wednesday as they face Central Missouri State who always seem to bring a good team in here every year. The Truman State wrestling team features two wrestlers from Kirksville with outsanding records so I would encourage everyone to get out and support the Truman State wrestling team.

The Kirksville High School wrestling team defeated a tough Marshall team on Tuesday night and will next be in action this weekend at the Platte County tournament.

Welcome to the SEC Missouri: tonight’s game with Georgia is not on TV locally and doesn’t appear to even be on Dish Network. The game is available in the St. Louis and Kansas City area but neither satellite provider appears to have picked up the game. I don’t get it: Missouri’s exhibition games are even on TV, why isn’t a conference game? There are six million channels on Dish Network and games between teams I have literally never heard of are on but not Missouri’s game at home against Georgia. Perhaps if Missouri hadn’t wasted valuable airtime last Saturday playing like they did against Mississippi then their game with Georgia would be on. Incedentally, have you ever taken the time to write Mississippi on a computer keyboard? It’s really fun, you should try it. Mississippi, Mississippi, Mississippi!!!!! Maybe there is something good about Missouri joining the SEC, they will play Mississippi every year.

The Kansas City Chiefs now have a new coach and a new general manager, all they need is a new offense and they will be in business. I recently heard an interview with Andy Reid where he said they would first look internally to see if there was an answer to their quarterback needs, let me help you out there Andy: the answer to the Chiefs quarterback needs will not be found internally. In fact, the person who answers the phone is more qualified to be the Chiefs quarterback than anyone you currently have under contract. The answer to the Chiefs quarterback needs will either be found through the draft or bia free agency or trade, don’t waste your time looking at what you have because you don’t have anything.

The NHL season finally gets underway this weekend with what apparently will be a 48 game schedule with the last game being on April 27. This means that by the time the have the playoffs the Stanley Cup finals won’t begin until probably mid June at the earliest. This of course means that if the Phoenix Coyotes were to make the Stanley Cup finals they would be playing ice hockey inside while it was 125 degrees outside. It will be interesting to see how fans react to the NHL as the lockout went on long enough they may have very well found other things to do with their entertainment dollar and may not be as willing to part with them for a NHL game as they used to be.

I am not the world’s biggest NBA fan but I have to say I really enjoy watching the Oklahoma City Thunder play. Oklahoma City really lucked out when the Seattle Super Sonics relocated to Oklahoma City because although they were horrible when they first got there it wasn’t like the Thunder were an expansion team. They were simply in a massive rebuilding phase and rebuild they did. From what little NBA I have seen so far this year the Thunder are far and away the best team.

Another interesting thing about this year’s NBA season has been the changing of the guard so to speak in Los Angeles. Los Angeles has typically been the Lakers town and the Clippers were just there but that has changed in a major way. The Clippers have totally taken over the hearts and minds of LA and are right there with the Thunder as one of the best teams in the NBA. The Lakers are old, slow, and either can’t or won’t play defense and are really an embarrassment to themselves right now.

Last week the voters for the baseball hall of fame chose to not elect any new members for the first time in many years. The three people who were most likely to be elected were all accused of or admitted to using performance enhancing drugs. You know what’s really sad about this: in at least two of the cases they almost surely could have gotten in on ability alone. When Barry Bonds was playing for the Pittsburgh Pirates he was one of the best all around players in the game and was putting up Hall of Fame numbers not by hitting home runds but by stealing bases, getting on base, and fielding. Yes, Bonds was one of the best defensive outfielders of the game at one point and it wasn’t until later in his career as the injuries started to pile up that he became a one demmentional power hitter who relied on simply crushing the ball. It would be interesting to know at what point he started to take performance enhancing substances which of course he has never publicly admitted to doing. However, given the massive changes his appearance and his hitting underwent it’s pretty clear what happened. The same can be said for Roger Clemens who again has never admitted to using performance enhancing substances. I don’t think he used them his whole career assuming he used them at all. I think that if he did use them it was later in his career when he quite honestly should have retired but continued to want to pitch and needed help to do it as his body and most certainly his arm began to wear out. Both players could have stayed clean and almost certainly made the Baseball Hall of Fame.

I used to be a Lance Armstrong fan, I even once told someone that I thought he was one of the greatest athletes of our generation. Not only did he win the Tour de France seven times but he overcame cancer and anyone who battles cancer automatically goes to hero status in my mind whether they win the battle or not. I thought that Armstrong was not only an exceptional athlete but also someone who was an inspiration to others and an example of the perserverance of the human spirit. When stories of his alleged taking of performance enhancing substances first started to surface I simply shrugged them off. I felt they were coming from people who simply weren’t good enough to beat him. He was better than they were and they couldn’t deal with it. However, those stories continued to persist and I began to wonder if maybe there could be some truth to them. I know very little about what it takes to be a successful bicycle racer other than knowing it is a very physically demanding sport. Armstrong said he didn’t do it and we all wanted to believe him. How could this ispirational hero who was so incredibly gifted possibly do something like that? His admission to Oprah that he did in fact dope is a slap in the face to more than just the riders who he competed against but also to those of us who believed in him. Lance Armstrong has now gone from being one of the greatest and most inspirational athletes of this generation to being nothing more than a boy riding a bicycle. Shame on you Lance! As far as your statement that you just want to put all this behind you and move on, life doesn’t work that way. This will haunt you for the rest of your life. I would also like to know why Oprah could get him to come clean and nobody else could. For the sake of baseball let’s have Oprah interview Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, Sammy Sosa, and Mark McGwire and put this whole steroid thing to rest. We’ll be back on Friday with a look ahead to this weekends AFC and NFC championship games and all the other weekend sport action. Thanks for taking the time and making the effort so support this blog and I hope you will do the same for all the blogs on this site.
Have a terrific Wednesday!